


Facing Him Meant Goodbye

by strwberrycake



Category: Tokyo Ghoul
Genre: Angst, Break Up, Broken Heart, Depressing, F/M, Goodbyes, Walking away
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-13
Updated: 2018-05-13
Packaged: 2019-05-06 02:53:46
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,621
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14632587
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/strwberrycake/pseuds/strwberrycake
Summary: You knew things were changing, but you didn't want them to.





	Facing Him Meant Goodbye

You didn’t notice it until you were sitting in the same coffee shop you met him in.

Sitting across from him, his eyes mesmerized by the contents of his mug in his familiar hands. You finally put together all of the pieces. All of the, “How did this happen?”, “Where did we go wrong?”,

“Was it my fault?”

You answered your own torturous questions. 

You didn’t know when it had started but you finally started recalling the moments where he should have been smiling the most, where his eyes should have sparkled, where his laugh should have been a reassuring response, where he should have been happy.

Happy with you.

And that was just it, wasn’t it?

Somewhere, god somewhere, along the way of your beautiful trip, he was left behind. 

You were simply playing house at one point. He had stayed behind in the realm of being neutral, being unaffected, being unmoved. You, however, kept on the road of being hopelessly in love. You didn’t notice the faded grins, you didn’t notice when his eyes didn’t light up when he smiled anymore, you didn’t notice when he stopped grabbing your hand just to rub small circles on your fingers. At some point he had stopped. 

But sitting here, across a withered, and tattered, image of your love, you finally noticed at least some of the things. 

You had wondered why he had stopped coming over, why he stopped calling you, why he stopped sending texts, why he made roundabout excuses on why he couldn’t respond to yours until five hours after the fact. 

You decided to have a serious talk with him, here. In this coffee shop. 

The smell of grounded coffee beans, and vanilla creamer swirled in the air. It was a really comforting scent, it smelled like home, it smelled like him. 

His gray eyes never lifted from the cup. The cup remained full. He never took one sip in the ten minutes the both of you had been sitting there. 

His hands were clasped around the mug, black nail polish adorning his nails. 

He was so calm. He was so hard to read sometimes.

You stared hard at him. Why wasn’t he saying anything?

You gently reached over to touch his hand. You felt his fingers curl against the mug a bit tighter. 

What was this?

He felt millions of miles away from you. At this very moment, being mere inches away from your boyfriend, he felt miles away. He wasn’t here anymore, at least, not mentally.

You had loved him. God, you loved him like you’ve never loved anyone before. Everything reminded you of him. 

“Kaneki…”

The unspoken law of silence was broken, finally, with your first word. 

He didn’t meet your eyes, in fact he barely responded at all. He gave a pitiful “Hm?” and kept his head down, snow-white hair shielding his eyes.

“...What’s going on?”

At first he didn’t move, or give any form of a reaction. He simply sat there. After a few seconds, he finally met your eyes.

Pale grey eyes, meeting (E/C) ones.

You had memorized those eyes. You had been through everything with them by your side. 

“(Y/N)...”

The way he said your name broke your heart. 

Just from the way he said it, you knew it couldn’t be good.

Of course, it couldn’t be good.

Why would you be here, in this position, if it was? 

Suddenly, your stomach churned and you couldn’t let him say what he wanted to say next. 

He parted his lips to begin but you cut him off,  
“Kaneki! Let’s… let’s take a walk? Please? Let’s walk! It’s wonderful weather outside!”

His eyes widened in surprise, but he slowly came back down and regained his expressionless, dead, features. 

“(Y/N)... it’s raining outside…”

He said it so gently, like he was speaking to a small child who just couldn’t understand.

“You brought your umbrella didn’t you? You know I love the rain.” You gave a weak laugh, knowing damn well he knew you loved the rain, but also knowing damn well he probably didn’t care anymore. 

He didn’t say anything for a moment but stood up and headed for the door, readying the umbrella.

The waiters within the shop bid you two farewell and “Thank you for coming!” but it all fell on deaf ears. 

You scurried quickly to Kaneki’s side to protect yourself from the rain. As the both of you walked, the rain pittering and pattering on the sidewalk filled the silence. After a few minutes, you felt daring, and willing. Maybe you were just overthinking everything. Maybe it was just an off few weeks. Maybe he still loved you, even though you couldn’t tell anymore. Maybe there’s still love there.

You reached out and grabbed his hand. It was cold. He was cold. 

You interlocked fingers with him tightly, after a few moments, he weakly responded, lazily interlocking fingers with yours.

It was a different kind of rejection. One that meant he was only half-assing his love for you. 

You held his hand, even tighter still, to make up for the lost energy on his side. When did it get to the point that you were mentally begging him to even hold your hand? 

You both kept walking, until you slowed down, and stopped, making him stop with you.

He looked at you, but his expression revealed nothing. He had on such a strong expressionless mask, almost like he was trying block all of his emotions out, deeming them useless. 

“Come home with me. I’m tired of walking.” You offered him a weak smile, to which he ignored completely. 

“I don’t think that’s a good idea.” 

Your smile wavered, “Why not? It’s cold, and I have plenty of blankets! Plus, it’s close.” 

“(Y/N).”

You smiled wider, almost desperate at this point. 

“Mhm?”

“I can’t do this anymore.”

Your heart dropped. Radio-silence followed afterwards. 

“Oh, this weather? I know! It’s cold! So that’s why I’m saying let’s go home!” You laughed, gripped his hand tightly, and began walking. 

“(Y/N).”

His stern tone made you stop. You were so cold, your teeth were chattering. But you knew this cold wasn’t due to the weather. You refused to look at him. You refused to feed into this.

“Kaneki, come on. I’ll make you hot chocolate and we can watch any movie you want, huh? Anything you want.” You pulled his hand, wanting him to give in and just go home with you. 

He finally reciprocated your energy and squeezed your hand tightly. 

“(Y/N)!” 

You couldn’t do this. Your heart was breaking. It was hanging on for dear life.  
Please don’t do this. You wouldn’t be able to handle it. You didn’t want to face him because facing him meant facing the inevitable. 

Facing him meant goodbye. 

Your shoulders shuddered, and you realized you were sobbing. Hot tears rolled down your cheeks, your free hand was shaking, your knees were weak. 

But you faced him anyways. You hoped to god, this wasn’t goodbye. 

You looked at him, straight-on, red-eyed, mascara smeared, and (H/C) wet hair sticking to your skin. 

You faced him anyways.

At least, his wall broke too. As soon as his eyes met yours, his widened in surprise, and soon a contorted expression of pain took over his features. He was breaking too.

He was almost scared to speak. He was scared of hurting you more than he already had. You looked so fragile, so easy to break through, like tissue-paper. 

He grabbed your form, casting away the umbrella, and hugging you close to him. He held you, digging his fingers into your shoulders, as if holding you this tight would stop you from falling apart. He ducked his head, placing his forehead onto your shoulder. His own sobs racked his body.

The tears wouldn’t stop coming. You didn’t know what were your own tears, and what were the sky’s. You bore your eyes into his. Hoping, praying, you were just delusional. 

Then it came.

“(Y/N). I’m sorry.” 

He was crying, too. Why was he crying? Why was he sorry?

“Please, believe me. I loved you.”

He loved you. For the very least, he loved you. 

“I’m sorry, (Y/N).”

The last part came out barely above a whisper, but it blared through your mind like an alarm.

“I can’t love you anymore.”

He didn’t love you anymore. But you still loved him. 

Everything he said afterwards you didn’t hear anymore. He went on to explain that he never regretted anything, he never regretted you, he just stopped being happy with you is all. That was all. He wasn’t happy with you anymore. You couldn’t make him happy anymore. 

You remember standing there, being soaked by the never-ceasing rain, and being held by the one person you wanted to be held by. But you didn’t want this. You didn’t want to be held like this. You didn’t want the reason he was holding you to be that he was trying to hold you together while he broke you. 

God, you loved him.

You loved him so much, it hurt. 

Being in love, hurt.

After that encounter, you never saw him again. You moved away to another city, not being able to bear a feigned friendship, and having mutual friends. 

You both had bared witness to each other’s rawest forms, both physically and mentally. You couldn’t handle being so close, yet so painfully far from him. You couldn’t stop loving him. That’s why you decided to pack up your things, and permanently separate yourself from himself. 

Ground coffee, and vanilla creamer still remind you of him. 

They still smell like him. 

They still smell like home.


End file.
